in the spirit of "you learn more from your mistakes", I would love to see what you did (and hear what you should have done better) after being put in a bad position that you never recovered from.

The 2nd ELC AMX video I'm going to post should be more interesting to you. We still win, but I lost 90% of my HP due to being reckless, and we would have likely lost our side of the map had I died due to my stupidity.

And I died later in a way that was positively potato and made for some anxious moments late in the match for our side.

Playing stock tanks can be pretty rough. That said, you can Free XP particular modules, then grind the rest.

E.g. for the T-54, the suspension isn't required to mount the top gun nor 2nd engine nor the 3 equipment. I Free XP'd the top gun on the T-54, then grinded the 2nd engine, then grinded the 2nd suspension.

Of course, there are many tanks where you can't mount upgraded guns, turrets, or engines without either getting the suspension upgrade first or mounting suspension equipment. I've done the latter (suspension equipment) in cases where I didn't have Free XP available.

I review the highly-regarded T-54 with a replay of a tier 10 Mines battle.

Stat line: 1st Class, 4.7k damage, 4 kills, 1 spot

The top-tier enemy platoon consists of elite players from -G-, PBKAC, and BULLS, so I discuss countering such dangerous opponents by anticipating where they're going and beating them to the punch with area denial, then burning down their pubbies.

I also demonstrate how to leverage the terrain on hill to safely fire on target(s) while minimizing exposure to snipers in their base.

Next episode: T-54 in a Tier 9 Sand River Battle

Let me know via the following poll which replay(s) you'd like to see after the second T-54 video:

Taking the hill on mines always seems to be a "high risk/high reward" proposition for me. I am just as likely to get perma-tracked by Batchat or AMX 13 90 1/2 way up the hill. Having another team mate for them to have to deal with gives both of you a better chance.

Taking the hill on mines always seems to be a "high risk/high reward" proposition for me. I am just as likely to get perma-tracked by Batchat or AMX 13 90 1/2 way up the hill. Having another team mate for them to have to deal with gives both of you a better chance.

Challenging the entrance to hill on Mines is one thing - actually pushing thru the entrance is another.

As I discussed in the T-54 video, I pushed hard because I had an advantageous spawn location closest to hill, so I pushed aggressively.

It's no different than being close to the south side in Karelia.

On both maps, if I spawn far from the hill entrance, I may go to hill to challenge tanks trying to enter it, but I don't push the entrance myself.

You also have to consider the relative compositions of both teams.

There are tanks, such as the E50, that I generally don't try pushing hill on Mines. The tank is a bit too slow for it and the profile is huge, which causes one to take a lot of damage.

Taking the hill on mines always seems to be a "high risk/high reward" proposition for me. I am just as likely to get perma-tracked by Batchat or AMX 13 90 1/2 way up the hill. Having another team mate for them to have to deal with gives both of you a better chance.

Just an fyi: assuming you are a relatively fast medium, the batchat/13 90 cannot track you going up. Why? Because it takes them a few seconds after they get all the way up the hill to be fully clipped, so as long as you aren't a slow med, then you can make it up without fear of those autoloaders.

This clearly only applies to those autoloaders, you should still be wary of other (non autoloader) tanks on the way up.

Thanks for the videos. I'll never play like you do (too old, too slow, poor situation awareness, etc) but it's nice to see how the game could be played. After watching your vids I think "I can do that."; then I go play a few games and realize "No, you can't do that!".

I'll never play like you do (too old, too slow, poor situation awareness, etc) but it's nice to see how the game could be played.

I'm a middle age guy myself, so I have to beat younger players with guile

Things like situational awareness definitely can be improved with conscious effort. I picked up WoT partly because I played mostly MMORPGs and not shooters, so I figured WoT would help me improve my hand-eye coordination, which it has.

Why do you not have heat in the t54? there are many, many situations where firing heat makes you much more effective, and it allows you much more flexibility to take out certain tanks.

Absolutely gold ammo (HEAT) for the T-54 is very powerful; 330 pen is nuts.

You may have missed this in the original post (bold emphasis added):

taugrim, on Dec 21 2014 - 07:24, said:

Therefore, I've started a new video I series called "Road to Unicum" in which share what I've learned as I progress towards account Unicum rating with silver ammo only. In these videos, I talk through how I'm reading each battle as it unfolds and discuss key decisions and mistakes. My hope is that these videos meaningfully help other players improve their gameplay.

No judgement on players who use gold ammo - it's a game mechanic - but gold ammo is problematic for game balance so I use silver ammo only.

For the sake of these educational videos, I think it's helpful to show gameplay and tactics without gold ammo.

FWIW, my WN8 for the T-54 with the top gun and silver ammo only is ~2970 (Super Unicum): ~2.3k dpg, ~1.83 spg, ~1.57 kpg.

The T-54 is one of those tanks that benefits greatly from gold ammo, given that the silver ammo penetration is below average but the gold ammo penetration is significantly above average.

If i end up rebuying it i will, but I was grinding it for a friend in exchange for him playing 8 bit tanks for me \

Edit: Actually when i played it (when i was like light blue recent) i pretty much only fired silver, and the dpg was ~2k. Granted, i should be able to do better now, but that is what the average blue player should be able to do with ap only.

In the previous 9 episodes, we focused on medium and light tank gameplay. Today, I discuss the responsibility of playing a beefy top-tier heavy, in terms of acting as a meat shield and playing aggressively, especially when your team is behind.

The E-75 has a fantastic armor layout that enables you to bounce a lot of incoming shots with proper angling. I demonstrate the optimal angle for the hull of the E-75 to protect the vulnerable Lower Front Glacis (LFG) while not over-exposing the thick 120mm side hull armor, especially when in the open ground where there is no hard cover. In the replay, I bounce all but 2 non-arty shots, and both times my tank was penetrated it was due to poor hull angling on my part.

Next episode: IS in a tier 7 Mountain Pass battle with controversy (TK'ing)

Let me know via the following poll which replay(s) you'd like to see after the IS:

due to the long 2.87 sec aim time and 10.38 sec reload time (with 100% crew and equipment), it's critical to keep track of enemy reload timers, so that when brawling you have time to aim sufficiently while minimizing risk

the side armor of 90mm is very thick for the tier, so you can angle your hull to increase the effective armor of your front hull without compromising your side armor

you don't need to unlock the suspension to mount all upgraded modules and all 3 equipment pieces.